Music Corner

A long-term project to make my living room more livable includes a creativity suite for musical exploration.
The piano, which had been nearest the door on the right when entering the living room, had become a dumping ground for textbooks, papers, and miscellaneous materials that people brought in from outside. It was rarely played despite our copious number of music books, and all of our other musical instruments--drums, percussion, guitars--were scattered around the room and in other areas of the house, also being neglected despite our shared love of music.

I painted the main L-shaped wall in our living room/dining room a dark turquoise and the two parallel walls a saffron. We have a large, metal dragon statue painted white that's meant to hang from a wall, possibly as a sconce. I've wanted to feature it on that wall for some time, and frame it. So I took an old frame from the garage that was garish and falling apart, removed the excess pieces from it, cleaned and primed it, and then painted it gold. Since the inner layer of the frame had a dark texture that I liked, I kept that protected during the painting process, and when everything else was dry, I removed the painter's tape, and added just a brushed hint of gold over the very tops of the texture, giving contrast to the color.

After measuring the wall and all the materials I wanted to place in the area, I painted a dark brown matte where the frame would hang, anchored the hooks for the statue, and hung the frame and dragon. When I was sure the dragon would hold, and not fall, crushing everyone and everything beneath it (about 24 hours later), I cleared the whole area and moved the piano by myself (quite a feat since I'm disabled; even the casters were groaning) from one side of the room to the other.

The kittens were interested in it, especially when we set the cat lamp into the center. The next stage was setting up the twin corner bookshelves on either side of the piano, and arranging our materials. We have a small basket of percussion instruments, a child's harpsichord, three guitars (one electric - partner's, one acoustic - daughter's, and one classical - mine), my daughter's celtic lap harp, two djembes, one bodhran, and one elk hide spirit drum. Our books are stacked up by type (piano, guitar, vocal, et al), and the fairy box holds extra harp and guitar strings as well as picks. All of the other objects are intended to add a playful, magical feel to the area to encourage its use, and since it's one of the first things seen when walking in the door (from the hall), I think it brightens our outlook on coming home. The area isn't finished; I want to get guitar hooks to hang our guitars on the edges of both walls, and there's a shelf that will soon hold a few other useful items, but I'm very happy with how this turned out. It's one of my first big decoration projects, and while it took me a lot more time than it would someone else, I think when everything is finally in place in the whole of the living room (including more lighting, it's dark!), we'll have a very cozy place to spend our evenings.